Hinata hissed and pulled her hand away from the stove. She shook her hand before putting her finger in her mouth. She was so frustrated she could swear.

She continued cooking with her nondominant hand until she looked up and realized Gaara was hovering shy of the counter. He moved around the house too quietly. "You hurt yourself frequently while cooking."

Hinata closed her fist over her burned finger. It wasn't even the first time this week on the same hand, so she couldn't deny it. She lowered her eyes down to the pan. "I'm sorry." She has always been a bit clumsy. Bruises and falls that her team found endearing were never as cute at home, where her father frowned at her like she was doing it on purpose.

"I don't understand what you are apologizing for." Gaara voiced. "I don't understand why you apologize for things that don't have a fault."

Hinata wasn't sure how to answer that. What was she apologizing for? Everything?

Gaara looked into the pan. "Would you… accept help?"

Hinata didn't really think about it, but did Gaara know how to cook? If he had been here by himself for years, he probably knew how to do something. She didn't really think to ask him because she had taken over meals for so long while he was still trapped in his room. "Do you want to help?"

"Temari doesn't like help," Gaara explained. "She gets upset."

Oh. He really didn't have any other frame of reference, did he? "Do you like to cook? I didn't think to ask you."

"I've never made the kind of food you do." Gaara came around the counter. "So I won't know how to do that."

"Well… I don't really know what I am doing with the ingredients half of the time. I am not familiar with the spices and the dried vegetables. I am sure there is something better that I could be making." Hinata stirred the pan.

"What is it you don't know how to use?" Gaara wondered.

Hinata took in a breath and put her hand on her hips. That was a long list, but if he could teach her, they might as well get started.

Hinata covered her mouth. "I didn't realize that was meant for tea."

"How were you using it?" Gaara held up the dried … something. It looked like a mushroom, but she wasn't sure it was, and though he knew how to use it, he didn't always know how they were made before they got to him.

"I thought it was just another of the dried vegetables I was putting it in oil." Hinata thought she was doing things wrong before, but now she knew she was doing much worse than she hoped.

"Well, I never liked the tea made with it." Gaara closed the jar. "Kankuro does."

Hinata picked at the last of her bowl. They didn't sit down to eat, just picked at their dinner while they dug through the cupboards. Gaara knew a lot more than she thought. "Did your sister teach you all this?"

Gaara shook his head. "Shukaku knows."

"I didn't even consider that…" Hinata forgot how old Shukaku was. It made sense that that was knowledge he might have, but she didn't think it was something he would relay. "How bad does he think my cooking is?"

Gaara paused to wait for an answer. "He won't say."

"That bad?" Hinata huffed.

"I don't think so." Gaara shook his head. "He just can't eat, so he wouldn't be able to tell you."

"I didn't think about that either." Hinata rested her hip on the counter. "I guess I never thought about if the tailed beasts ever ate."

"Not for hunger," Gaara answered. "Shukaku used to eat human sacrifices."

Hinata blinked at him. "Oh."

"He doesn't anymore." Gaara finished.

Hinata pressed her lips together to keep the smile from breaking from Gaara's flat delivery. It shouldn't be funny, but his reassuring her so dryly was. "I should be glad about that. I'm the only one here."

"I don't think he would eat you." Gaara shook his head. "He enjoys having around."

"I guess that's why you keep me, isn't it?" Hinata offered him a smile, but Gaara's eyes dropped, and his cheek hollowed. She didn't mean it that way, but he clearly took it that way.

This was a difficult subject because, technically, she wasn't being held prisoner like he acted and like she sometimes felt. Her father sent her. It was her father's word that was keeping her here. At this point, she wondered if she asked to leave if Gaara would let her.

She could see behind his eyes that he felt shame when it was brought up. Gaara desperately wanted the company, and the only way he could have it was to pull someone into the same situation he was in.

There was something that was bothering her about him being trapped here, though.

Did she ask? "Why are you here?" She wondered aloud. "Why did they send you here alone?"

Hinata expected him to look down or away in shame like he did just now, but he was much more confident in this. "I'm a monster. They want me away from the village."

"You were a child." Hinata reasoned. "It wasn't your fault. Sending you away to be exiled seems extreme."

"Trying to kill me didn't work." Gaara's eyes darted away.

Wasn't he… so young? Demon child or not, how could they try to kill a child? How could she ask about that?

"I murdered my uncle who was sent to kill me, then I killed the man who ordered me killed," Gaara answered. "I only regret killing my uncle. He was under orders. He didn't want to kill me. I remind him too much of my mother."

Hinata pierced her lips together. "I thought… the second person was your father." Was the information wrong?

"My father was Kazekage," Gaara explained.

Hinata gapped. That was the piece she was missing. The assassination of their leader would explain why they would just cast a child into the desert.

Discovering that your father ordered to have you killed must have been heartbreaking. Even her father didn't hate her that much, and if Hizashi had…

Hinata reached for him. Gaara didn't understand at first, but she wanted to give him a hug. She was sure that he had never gotten one after hearing that story. She wrapped her arms around him and waited for him to follow suit.

"This is… an odd reaction." Gaara voiced into her shoulder. He didn't sound like he was complaining.

Hinata couldn't reply because she was sure her voice would break. She couldn't get a tiny child out of her head, scared, angry, and horribly betrayed by his family.

Gaara twisted his fists into the back of her shirt, and her heart broke a little more.